Dear Ham radio operators, as of Feburary 9th 2014 we have lost contact DANDE, however, we are still autonomously tracking and would appreciate your help!! We highly value any information you can provide while we attempt to recover communication with our satellite.

Please visit our DANDE beacon portal to upload beacons from your location. To email us your beacon information, please send it to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Induced by the neutral-atmosphere density, drag is the major perturbation on satellites in low earth orbit. True density deviates as much as 21% from model predictions, introducing error into crucial government and private space operations with applications to situational awareness, space surveillance, laser communications, re-entry prediction, rendezvous and proximity ops. A need exists to measure physical or 'true' density, quantify density variations, and to provide in-situ model calibration data.The Drag and Atmospheric Neutral Density Explorer (DANDE) will be a low-cost density, wind, and composition-measuring satellite that will provide data for the calibration and validation of operational models and improve our understanding of the thermosphere. The spacecraft is being designed and built at the Colorado Space Grant Consortium (COSGC) in collaboration with the University of Colorado at Boulder Aerospace Engineering Sciences department, Air Force Space Command - Space Analysis/A9A, and research faculty at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). In response to the AFOSR Nanosatellite 5 competition in 2007, the idea of DANDE was created, and after a 2-year competition the satellite was selected as the sole flight program at the final Flight Competition Review held by AFRL. Since 2009, DANDE has been in process of being built, integrated, tested and is now flight ready. In 2011 the project's team and AFRL received permission to manifest the satellite on a Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) launch vehicle. This effort is sponsored by the University Nanosat Program at the Air Force Research Laboratory.